Monthly Archives: December 2017

46 As Jesus was speaking to the crowd, his mother and brothers stood outside, asking to speak to him. 47 Someone told Jesus, “Your mother and your brothers are outside, and they want to speak to you.” 48 Jesus asked, “Who is my mother? Who are my brothers?”49 Then he pointed to his disciples and said, “Look, these are my mother and brothers.50 Anyone who does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother!”Matthew 12:46-50 (NLT)

15 So you have not received a spirit that makes you fearful slaves. Instead, you received God’s Spirit when he adopted you as his own children. Now we call him, “Abba, Father.” 16 For his Spirit joins with our spirit to affirm that we are God’s children. 17 And since we are his children, we are his heirs. In fact, together with Christ we are heirs of God’s glory. But if we are to share his glory, we must also share his suffering.Romans 8:15-17 (NLT)

495 Have you seen the affection and the confidence with which Christ’s friends treat him? In a completely natural way the sisters of Lazarus reproach Jesus for being away: “We told you! If only you’d been here!…” Speak to him with calm confidence: “Teach me to treat you with the loving friendliness of Martha, Mary, and Lazarus and as the first Twelve treated you, even though at first they followed you perhaps for not very supernatural reasons.”

One of the critiques of contemporary music back in the 70’s and 80’s ( and still repeated now quoting 40-year-old lyrics as if they are contemporary) is that it treats God without proper reverence, it treats Him as if He is a common friend or a brother.

But that is exactly what the church had rediscovered in scripture. The idea that we are indeed co-heirs with Jesus, that we are His brothers and sisters. That God isn’t distant, just sitting in heaven waiting to judge us, but that He is here, caring for us, protecting us, sanctifying us.

He’s seen us at our worst, and still loves us, and still wants to be in communion with us.

That is why St. Josemaria, that very reverent and devout priest talks about treating God the way Mary and Martha did. He understands that reverent doesn’t mean distant, that being in awe draws us closer to God, it doesn’t stop from standing on holy ground, it just teaches us to do so, trusting and depending on Him.

Think about the blessings that are shared with you in the sacraments. Do these draw you closer to God, do they fill you with confidence to approach Him, depending on His work to make you holy and righteous? Doesn’t the author of Hebrews tell us that because of Christ we can approach the throne of God with confidence? Does the promise that we will dwell in the very glory of God urge you to approach Him?

In your baptism, you were united with Jesus in His death and in His resurrection. Dying with Him, rising with Him, there is nothing more intimate than that! Go back, read this paragraph again, you have shared a more intimate moment with God than you have in any other relationship you have.

Some will say we cannot and point where those who approach God in the wrong way were dealt with severely. That familiarity breeds contempt, and that these narratives prove it! No, they don’t. Indeed they were treated severely, but that is because they did what they did contrary to what God had taught them, what God had established. They are like those people who spell God a G_d, or who are afraid to use YHWH and replace it with Lord. They are so afraid to use God’s name in vain that they don’t use it! Which is also in vain, disobeying God’s command to call upon His beautiful, precious, powerful Name!

We need to know God, not just know about Him. We need to treat Him much like Mary and Marta, like Lazarus, even like Peter. Don’t worry, God will correct us when we need to be corrected. But let yourself be drawn to Him, and reach out to Him.

Lord Jesus, help us to be drawn to you, and give us the confidence in your promise, in your love, in the work you did at the cross, drawing and uniting us to you. Help us to be one with You, even as you and the Father are one. Remind us that you sent the Holy Spirit to guide us as we approach you. AMEN!

6 “No, this is the kind of fasting I want: Free those who are wrongly imprisoned;lighten the burden of those who work for you.Let the oppressed go free,and remove the chains that bind people.7 Share your food with the hungry, and give shelter to the homeless. Give clothes to those who need them, and do not hide from relatives who need your help.8 “Then your salvation will come like the dawn, and your wounds will quickly heal. Your godliness will lead you forward, and the glory of the LORD will protect you from behind.9 Then when you call, the LORD will answer. ‘Yes, I am here,’ he will quickly reply. “Remove the heavy yoke of oppression. Stop pointing your finger and spreading vicious rumors!Isaiah 58:6-9 (NLT)

The beauty offered the Child of Bethlehem is dedicated to all, and we need it like daily bread. Those who would rob a child of beauty to make something useful out of it do not support but destroy; they take away the light, without which all our calculations turn cold and trivial. Of course, if we truly join the pilgrimage of the centuries, which was anxious to lavish the most beautiful things of this world on the newborn King, then we must never forget that he still lives in a stable, in a prison, in the favelas [South American slums], and that we do not praise him should we refuse to find him there. Yet such an awareness will not enslave us under the tyranny of usefulness, where joy becomes a stranger and somber seriousness a dogma.

During our Advent and Christmas services, my congregation started singing a mash-up of an incredible Christmas hymn (For Unto Us A Child is Born) and an older contemporary praise song (Open the Eyes of my Heart). It is a striking combination, proclaiming the joy and glory of Christ here, among us, and our desperate need to see Him lifted high up on the cross, and in our praises.

It came to my mind immediately as I read the words from Pope Benedict XVI ( Cardinal Ratzinger when he wrote them) Taken from an article in my devotions, the part above shows a truth we cannot ignore.

That Christ is found, now as much as then, with those who need Him.

For Jesus always comes to those who cannot provide for themselves.

That is the interesting thing about the Magi, about these wisest of men, they realized they needed Him too, and they searched him out. They didn’t hesitate when they found out hi humble origins when they didn’t find him lying in a castle or on some grand estate. They knew they needed to find him and honor Him, for He was their hope.

I think the former pope is right in this, that it is among the needy that we find Jesus, but as we go there, we don’t just find those we can help, we find out we are just as in need of a Savior. just as in need of someone to minister to us. And so Jesus brings us together, all with different gifts, all broken in different ways and therefore needy, but all in need of Hi love, a love which will heal and transform us all.

Isaiah notes this as well, as He writes of our needing to fast, to break away from the life that is all about us. For then we find God answering our prayers, we find His presence and His work that transforms us into saints, into something righteous. To break apart from what Benedict XVI calls the Tyranny of usefulness.

We need to find ourselves with those we thought more broken, and the realize the reality of our common need, we find joy, for we hear Hi answer to our call, “I AM HERE.”

For He is, He is Immanuel God with Us! AMEN!

Ratzinger, Joseph. Co-Workers of the Truth: Meditations for Every Day of the Year. Ed. Irene Grassl. Trans. Mary Frances McCarthy and Lothar Krauth. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1992. Print.

Devotional Thought for our seemingly broken days:16 Once a man came to Jesus. “Teacher,” he asked, “what good thing must I do to receive eternal life?” 17 “Why do you ask me concerning what is good?” answered Jesus. “There is only One who is good. Keep the commandments if you want to enter life.” 18 “What commandments?” he asked. Jesus answered, “Do not commit murder; do not commit adultery; do not steal; do not accuse anyone falsely; 19 respect your father and your mother, and love your neighbor as you love yourself.” 20 “I have obeyed all these commandments,” the young man replied. “What else do I need to do?” 21 Jesus said to him, “If you want to be perfect, go and sell all you have and give the money to the poor, and you will have riches in heaven; then come and follow me.” 22 When the young man heard this, he went away sad, because he was very rich. 23 Jesus then said to his disciples, “I assure you: it will be very hard for rich people to enter the Kingdom of heaven. 24 I repeat: it is much harder for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of God than for a camel to go through the eye of a needle.” 25 When the disciples heard this, they were completely amazed. “Who, then, can be saved?” they asked. 26 Jesus looked straight at them and answered, “This is impossible for human beings, but for God everything is possible.”Matthew 19:16-26 (TEV)

486 A heart which loves the things of the earth beyond measure is like one fastened by a chain—or by a “ fine thread”—which stops it flying to God.

If you are going to make a resolution this year, I urge you to look closely at the above passage from scripture, and the words of wisdom from St. Josemaria.

And before you vow to lose weight, kick caffeine or some other bad habit, or taking on something new like going back to school or learning something, I want to ask you something.

What is holding you back?

What has tied you down, and restrains you from living life.

Of course, that leads to another question, what does it mean to live life.

The young man in the gospel story was after that, for to live eternally is not just about life after, but it is the life that is given now, which is never taken from us, even if we physically die. Modern psychology might call it self-actualization, or they might point to obtaining some state of consciousness. We might joke about it as being at one with the force.

And most religions, including cults like Scientology, have some way to attain it, some way of freeing your mind and soul from that which separates you from eternity. Some may even see it similarly to Jesus, and realize that it is not about attaining something, but freeing your heart and soul from things which bind it, restrict it, and stop you from soaring like an eagle, free of all encumbrances.

For the rich young man, ( Paul the apostle perhaps?) it was wealth. There are a number of other things we could suggest, things that tie u down and restrict us from walking with God. These things may even be the negative things of our past, that we can’t seem to escape the impact of, or at least we think we cannot. We can’t tie ourselves to these things, but we too often do.

So how do we escape? How do we cut these things that bind us, that we “love” an yet hate? How do we stop loving these things that hold us back?

We can not.

That’ right, we cannot.

Our only hope, the only strategic option we have is simply this.

Realize you love God more. And the way to do that spends time dwelling in His love. Paul says it this way:

18 And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. 19 May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God.Ephesians 3:16-19 (NLT)

If you want to see a change in your life in 2018, if you want to break free from all that holds you back, then experience His love.

Come join his people as we celebrate that love, as we share in His gospel, as we commune with Him in the sacrament He ordained to do this very thing. Spend time in His word, not just studying it, but looking at it to see how He loves his people. Rejoice as you encounter His faithfulness to them, knowing it will be the same to you.

This will change you, even though you may not see it yourself. Others will, and they will praise God as you get even more hungry and thirsty to spend time with Him.

The Lord is with you… you just need to know that. And I pray all that read this will! (Pray for me a well, because I need to!

May you realize the joy and peace God gives you, as Jesus comes and makes His home, right here, with you!

Home for the Holidays

Maybe it is a certain smell, or perhaps an ornament you take out of the box, or it’s a Christmas Carol being sung in a certain way, but most of us have something that takes us back “Home” for the holidays. You know, that place that exists in time, that defines what your heart knows as being home, as life is perfect.

For me, it is sitting at the piano that now sits in my aunt’s basement, much as it sat in my grandfather’s basement. It was there, playing Adeste Fideles and the First Noel that was a moment I define as being “home”. There are things that remind us of those precious days. And for those who are blessed, you can find more than one example of them. Maybe it is this year that you will find the scene of home that will etch itself in your memory as being “home for the holidays” The time where being with friends and family when peace reigned and was so real

In our gospel reading this morning, we see an incredible statement about being home.

So Jesus became human, and made his home among us.

God became man and found a place to live. Here, among us.

Not just with the apostles back in the day, but here, with you and me. He in our lives, where He still lives and reigns today.

In these incredible deep and complex words that start John’s sharing of the good news of Jesus, these words are the ones we most need to hear, the words that are the most mind-blowing, the hardest to make sense of,

Jesus became man, and made His home among us.

The Theology.

There is a lot in the passage, from the teaching about the Trinity to the description of the world rejecting Him. Theologically, we could spend weeks going over the first five verses. And the “who is God?” questions would still not find answers to satisfy everyone.

The next few verses, talking about some not recognizing and rejecting him, while others would be born again, not a physical birth but something more incredible, being born as children of God.
Theologians have talked and argued and wrote about such things since the first century. Words longer my arm have been used by experts to determine exactly how God did what He didn’t describe.

These verses are all important – please understand me, we have to struggle with them, we need to work them, but tonight, we need to realize this.

God came and made His home among us.
His Home.

Other translations use the word dwelt with us, and that isn’t a horrid translation, but it doesn’t quite give the passage the full incredible joy that should overflow as we hear this.

First, because the word isn’t just dwelt, it is to tabernacle, to set up a residence with us. For someone in the first century, this was setting up the permanent tent residences in which you would live. It is setting up a home.

There is another sense to this, the idea that the verb is aorist tense. It doesn’t have a definite time period, and in this case, not a specific end. It’s not just about the day Jesus was born, or end the day He was crucified and died.

What this means is that we can say this. Even as He came and made His home among the apostles, He is still coming and making His home among us.

And like the apostles, we behold His glory, we get caught up in His love, we find healing for our hearts and souls in His mercy, we find hope for our tomorrows, for He is present, and promises to never leave or forsake us.

He is here. He has made His home in our lives.

This is the place He calls home.

As we come to the altar, may you realize the glory you behold and the peace of God that will make you realize that you are home with God! AMEN!

15 While He was reclining at the table in Levi’s house, many tax collectors and sinners were also guests with Jesus and His disciples, because there were many who were following Him. 16 When the scribes m of the Pharisees saw that He was eating p with sinners q and tax collectors, r they asked His disciples, “Why does He eat s with tax collectors and sinners?” 17 When Jesus heard this, He told them, “Those who are well don’t need a doctor, but the sick do need one. I didn’t come to call the righteous, but sinners.” Mark 2:15-17

In revising the Roman office, its ancient and venerable treasures are to be so adapted that all those to whom they are handed on may more extensively and easily draw profit from them.

It is one of the great paradoxes of Christianity, those who think Jesus wouldn’t associate with them are the very ones He came to unite to himself. And those, who think they are spiritually adept often miss out on the blessing.

I dare say that our liturgies have for too long aided and abetted this problem. The look and sound more like the pious Pharisee than the broken tax-collector. The content of our services, from the mass to vespers and then compline need to be in the language that is profitable, that is beneficial for those broken by the weight of sin. It needs to resonate with their soul and reveal to them the love and mercy of God, their God, who would have them dwell in peace.

I think those at Vatican II and those who influenced the council’s deliberations were starting to see this. That the liturgy was for all the people of God, not just those who knew the right actions, the right words, and could repeat them without knowing the power of their meaning. ( I wish my own small part of Christianity would follow suit, but I fear it is heading away from such thoughts)

We desperately need to be formed by the word of God in our prayers, in our liturgy. And by we, I don’t mean those on the membership roster of our church and the churches we trust. It means all the people of God, those He died for, those He is drawing to himself, those who may fight now, only to be baptized tomorrow. The people of God include all who don’t believe God’s mercy is available to them, for in their humility, they will receive it. Those who think they are good enough already, why would they bother? The liturgy can cause us to really cry out for His mercy, and express praise and wonder at God’s love seen as Jesus was slaughtered like a lamb, that we might live.

If the word is to form us, we have to be able to understand it, simply and without a dictionary, lexicon, and thesaurus by our side. This message is to needed, to precious, to amazing to conceal it with elaborate words, and movements that have no meaning because they are not know, not explained, not heard.

We all, from the youngest to the oldest, from every continent and country, from every economic group, language group, everyone, needs to know that Jesus came for us all. It is really a simple concept, one spoken originally in simple Hebrew, Aramaic, and common Greek. We can and show do the same today so that the people God draws to us will know Him, as the Spirit reveals Him to them through our words, our music, our liturgy.

As we finalize our words for the Christmas celebration, may we do so, and may all those the Spirit draws near profit from them. AMEN!

Right away Jesus understood in His spirit that they were thinking like this within themselves and said to them, “Why are you thinking these things in your hearts? 9 Which is easier: to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Get up, pick up your mat, and walk’? 10 But so you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins,” He told the paralytic, 11 “I tell you: get up, pick up your mat, and go home.” Mark 2:8-11 HCSB

476 For each one of us, as for Lazarus, it was really a veni foras—come out—which got us moving. How sad it is to see those who are still dead and don’t know the power of God’s mercy! Renew your holy joy, for opposite the man who is decomposing without Christ, there is another who has risen with him.

A little background is necessary for this blog.

I grew up with a genetic disorder known as Marfan’s Syndrome. It’s one of those nasty connective tissue disorders that affects my eyes, my spine, and my heart. It was responsible for a cardiac arrest in my twenties, and the necessity of two of my heart valves being replaced 20 years ago. I also had to deal with severe asthma attacks and allergies that put me in the hospital often and caused me to miss as many as 60 days of school in third grade. Looking back, I was probably significantly on the Asperger’s spectrum, because my social skill wasn’t exactly…. normal. (If you know me, you know it still isn’t!)

In the process, for all of the above, my parents would have people pray for me. We even went to see Kathryn Kuhlman once, which required a really long bus trip. My folks did what they could as did the experts. If ripping off the roof of a house would have secured my healing – they would have done it. For me, the idea of physical healing isn’t just a passing idea, it is something desired for a long time. Regular back pain, poor eyesight, and the clicking of mechanical valves impact me greatly at times – both physically and psychologically, and more times than I want to admit, spiritually.

As I read that passage this morning, it hit me. God did answer a prayer for healing in my life, but not the physical healing we all wanted. Instead, what God gave me was what the paralytic was offered, the forgiveness of my sin.

All of it, and that is a lot.

From the things that would cause me not to sleep at night because of guilt and shame, to the little things in the eyes of the world, to the sin that I attempt to justify.

He came to die, that all my sin would be paid for, the debt I incurred by committing it erased. For that, I will ever be grateful.

I think the scribes had it right for once when they noted that forgiving sins was a far greater miraculous act, a act far more requiring the full power, authority and responsibility of God.

There are doctors and others who can perform physical miracles today, there are people who have the gift of doing so, and among those even some who don’t believe in God. But forgiving sin, that is a whole different matter.

And Jesus, fully God, fully man, can forgive our sin and does. He has that right, He has the ability, and he invested that ability in His people, with the responsibility given to those who shepherd them, who guide them into God’s presence, the men who reveal God’s presence in their lives.

This miracle is one that impacts us far beyond our mortal life. That is why it required more dunamis, more power/authority/responsibility/capability than other miracles. It was why the scribe doubted.

Would I love to be healed completely of the effect of Marphans? Yes
Would I like to be more socially skilled, and less awkward? Hmmm… tough one. 🙂 (there are days when the world not making sense is a good thing)

But were I to have all that, and not have the forgiveness of sins, all would be lost. So I will rejoice in my weakness, and rejoice in a Lord that loves me and shows me the mercy I so need, and so do not deserve. This is what raises us like Lazarus from the dead, this is the power of God’s mercy at work, this is the power that raised Christ from the dead at work in you and I!

9 In those days Jesus came from Nazareth h in Galilee and was baptized in the Jordan by John. 10 As soon as He came up out of the water, He saw the heavens being torn open and the Spirit descending to Him like a dove. 11 And a voice came from heaven: You are My beloved Son; I take delight in You! 12 Immediately the Spirit drove Him into the wilderness. t 13 He was in the wilderness 40 days, being tempted u by Satan. v He was with the wild animals, w and the angels x began to serve Him. Mark 1:9-13 HCSB

Thus we are told that only through Christ did real joy appear and that in our life, in the last analysis, nothing matters more than coming to recognize and to understand Christ, the God of grace, the light and the joy of the world. Only then will our joy be true, when it no longer relies on things that can be snatched away from us and can perish, but when it is rooted in the innermost core of our existence, which no power in all the world is able to take away from us. And every outward loss ought to become for us a pathway into these innermost realms and to prepare us ever more for our true life.

Christmas is an emotional rollercoaster of epic extremes. To go from the pressure of rushing around, trying to find perfect gifts, to the moments where a hug from a friend or relative means everything, to the loneliness that occurs, as we realize who we are missing in our life. Like being on the roller coaster, we are not in control, and we don’t always know how to prepare for the next drop or the corkscrewing turn.

For those in ministry, the roller coaster includes our ministry, as well as our own “private” lives. Often we go from trying to reconcile a divided family, to celebrate a service with joy, to worrying about a friend in surgery or recovery, to being there while another friend mourns. And we get to tell everyone that there is JOY in this world!

The reading from Mark’s gospel helps this morning, as we see Jesus going from His miraculous baptism, from hearing the Father’s cry of delight, immediately into the desert, to be assaulted by Satan. From the purity of a sacred moment, into the assault and oppression of Satan himself.

Jesus knows our roller coasters, he knows all too well our brokenness, our struggle with our emotions trying to keep up with the moment’s challenge. In revealing His love, in dying on the cross and rising again, He comes into our lives. and brings peace.

This is what Pope Benedict is talking about as he teaches about joy, this joy that comes from realizing that we are in the presence of Jesus. as we are given the hope of glory, as we are comforted by the presence of the Holy Spirit. The roller coaster doesn’t disappear, but we realize there will be a time when this ride ends, and we will share in His glory.

If I have learned anything about Christmas and its emotional rollercoaster, it is this. In order to survive it, I need to spend some time, looking at the manger, trying to put myself there, realizing that the Lord came into our lives because He loves us. Then, hearing Him reveal HIs love, we find the deepest peace, and in that peace, joy.

God has given Himself to us, fully. Think on that, focus on it, as we prepare to celebrate it, together.

Ratzinger, Joseph. Co-Workers of the Truth: Meditations for Every Day of the Year. Ed. Irene Grassl. Trans. Mary Frances McCarthy and Lothar Krauth. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1992. Print.

5 “When you pray, don’t be like the hypocrites who love to pray publicly on street corners and in the synagogues where everyone can see them. I tell you the truth, that is all the reward they will ever get.6 But when you pray, go away by yourself, shut the door behind you, and pray to your Father in private. Then your Father, who sees everything, will reward you.7 “When you pray, don’t babble on and on as people of other religions do. They think their prayers are answered merely by repeating their words again and again.Matthew 6:5-7 (NLT)

Sometimes I ask myself: “To whom do you pray?”And it is not hard to find the answer: “To God”, the Father or Jesus. There also are many people who pray to God as divine essence. This is not prayer, of course.Christian prayer is primarily a person to person event; we pray to the Father or to the Son or to the Holy Spirit.

90. The divine office, because it is the public prayer of the Church, is a source of piety, and nourishment for personal prayer. And therefore priests and all others who take part in the divine office are earnestly exhorted in the Lord to attune their minds to their voices when praying it. The better to achieve this, let them take steps to improve their understanding of the liturgy and of the Bible, especially of the psalms.In revising the Roman office, its ancient and venerable treasures are to be so adapted that all those to whom they are handed on may more extensively and easily draw profit from them.

One of the hardest and yet profitable lessons I’ve learned over the years is about prayer. And that prayer is not just conversation, it is an intimate conversation with God.

Back in Junior High, my friends and I would say the rosary or pray through the stations of the cross, and we would make it a race, thinking that it was simply the saying of the prayers themselves that resulted in a blessing. Later, when I was a Protestant, training for the ministry, we only prayed “from the heart”. These prayers were full of words, especially “Lord” and “if it be Your will” and other phrases, spoken more because we didn’t know what to say, or how to say it. And so a prayer over a meal would last well into the time a normal family would be having dessert! In many ways, though perhaps heartfelt, they were babbling, as Matthew’s Gospel tells us the prayers of those who don’t know God pray.

Prayer is anything but vain, and it shouldn’t normally be incoherent babbling ( unless in the midst of trauma – but that is another conversation) And whether the prayer is one written by some other pilgrim or our own, it needs to resonate with both our brokenness, and the hope we have in the God who will heal.

This is something Vatican II was obviously trying to address, as it looked at the various services throughout the day, We need to know what we are saying, we need to realize that God is hearing these words, personally. It is not a formula, nor an algebraic equation to work out, nor the vain babbling of someone struggling to think of something to say. ( it is usually at that point when we should be listening, rather than just babbling – again – another blog sometime)

it is when the conversation is personal, in the midst of the deepest, most intimate relationship we have, with the Lord who created us, that we are actually praying. A prayer that is beneficial, because it is sacred, a time set apart just for us, individually and in a group, to walk with the God we are learning to love, as He reveals to us how much He loves us. This is when prayer is beneficial, when it is profitable, when we realize how much we are sustained.

So, my friends, I urge this, take the time, savor not just His word you hear and meditate on, but savor the words you say to Him, hear them, and know He is responding. For you are His children, and He is your Father and your God. Amen!

50 Jesus shouted again with a loud voice and gave up His spirit. 51 Suddenly, the curtain of the sanctuary was split in two from top to bottom; the earth quaked and the rocks were split. 52 The tombs were also opened and many bodies of the saints who had fallen •asleep were raised. 53 And they came out of the tombs after His resurrection, entered the holy city, and appeared to many. 54 When the centurion and those with him, who were guarding Jesus, saw the earthquake and the things that had happened, they were terrified and said, “This man really was God’s Son!” Matt 27:50-54 HCSB

You possess God only in community with others; you speak to God only if you call him “Our” Father, using the “we” that includes all of God’s children. Jesus is not the property of just one people or one organization. His domain is oecumenical, universal, as is conveyed in the account mentioning the emperor. Faith is the path offered to all peoples. The era of Jesus, the era of the Church, is the missionary era. Our faith is in touch with Jesus only if we understand and live it as missionaries, only if we truly desire that all flesh shall see the salvation of God.

35 It is patently contrary to God’s command and Word to make laws out of opinions or to require that they be observed in order to make satisfaction for sins and obtain grace,36 for the glory of Christ’s merit is blasphemed when we presume to earn grace by such ordinances.

You can fool others about the relationship you have with God. A pious posture, a liturgy held with angelic face, the breviary opened and handy when someone enters the room are masks which have stuck so well to certain persons whom they really believed to be respectable and pious.

As I read the devotional readings this morning, they all seem to be about gaining access to God. Working from the bottom quote up,

Pope Francis’s quote talks about people pretending to have access. When you and I are like this, we pretend to be spiritual, we pretend to be holy, we pretend to have all our crap together, when inside the masks we are empty, broken, and struggling. We are looking around, wanting what others seem to have, but we can’t gain access. We are seemingly cut off, from what we need, from the fellowship of God

The early Lutheran Fathers talk about the times where we are so broken, we want to block others from the healing that all of us need. We do this by setting up rules, by creating religious doctrines and requiring people to confess them, even if they are only our logical extrapolations. (recently I read a note from a minister that said unless you believe Mary didn’t suffer pain when she gave birth to Jesus, you were a heretic! I’ve probably done similar over the years.. ) But again, access is seemingly blocked, we are seemingly cut off.

Pope Benedict XVI approached it a bit differently, showing us the access we have together. That together we enter the presence of God, that together we commune with Him, that part of gaining that access is becoming a missionary, going out and bringing others back in, for being a part of the Kingdom of God is that incredible. We have been given access to God, freely, and our joy grows as others join us.

The most remarkable of the readings is the reading about the death of Jesus. For there we see access incredible given to us. The first hint of access is when the Temple veil is torn, and people could see into the Holy of Holies. The place where God made himself know was now open to all, no one is denied the Holy of Holies.

But there is another access that is incredible – as those who died are welcomed back to life. You see, God is not just the God of the living, but He is the God of those who have died, and those yet to be born. The church is made up of all His people, those who have entered into His rest, and those of us still in the mission field of this life. Because of Jesus’ death, we are joined to that death and to the resurrection, because He loves us.

This is the access we have. We don’t have to pretend we have it, we don’t have to guard it and create barriers to it. We come into His presence together, with saints from every time, every place, For God has made us Him. AMEN!

Ratzinger, Joseph. Co-Workers of the Truth: Meditations for Every Day of the Year. Ed. Irene Grassl. Trans. Mary Frances McCarthy and Lothar Krauth. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1992. Print.

Tappert, Theodore G., ed. The Book of Concord the Confessions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church. Philadelphia: Mühlenberg Press, 1959. Print.

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Devotional Thought for our seemingly broken days:14 So the Word became human and made his home among us. He was full of unfailing love and faithfulness. And we have seen his glory, the glory of the Father’s one and only Son. 15 John testified about him when he shouted to the crowds, “This is the one I was talking about when I said, ‘Someone is coming after me who is far greater than I am, for he existed long before me.’” 16 From his abundance we have all received one gracious blessing after another. 17 For the law was given through Moses, but God’s unfailing love and faithfulness came through Jesus Christ. 18 No one has ever seen God. But the one and only Son is himself God and is near to the Father’s heart. He has revealed God to us.John 1:14-18 (NLT)

When we feel the presence of God in our daily lives, we can only say “God is here”and the first thing to do is to fall on our knees.

In the closing prayer of the [former Christmas Vigil] Mass, the faithful ask God for the grace, through the celebration of his Son’s birth, to “draw new breath”. Why and in what sense they wish to “draw new breath” is not explained, and so we are at liberty to understand this expression in the human and simple meaning of the words. This feast ought to let us draw “a breath of fresh air”. Admittedly, given the way we have burdened this feast with busyness nowadays, it much sooner renders us breathless and suffocates us in the end with deadlines

I wonder how clearly we hear the words we sing?

Are we ready to be thrust into the presence of God, to be in awe, and even tremble as we gaze upon as beauty, are we ready to be overwhelmed by the sight of His glory, and humbled by the purity of His love?

Are we ready to be so overtaken in that moment that our knees weaken and our bodies collapse?

How can we prepare for that moment? Can we be better prepared than Herod, the shepherds, and the angels were the first time Jesus came? Only two elderly people were well prepared for that, ready to behold the glory of Christ incarnate. Two old people who spent their days in prayer, and yet, they were still in awe of God with us.

There are ways to build our expectation, and to get a glimpse of what we are about to encounter. We find that “preview” in the Eucharist, the Feast of Christ, where we commune with His Body and His Blood. That moment we realize how much He is present in our lives, preparing us, cleansing us, setting us apart for this incredible eternity He planned for us.

Church should remind us of this, giving us that “new breath,” that fresh air that we need! It does when the love of God, in all its height and depth, width and breadth is revealed to us in Jesus.

O Come to us, Emmanuel! And until you come in all your glory, fulfill your promise to come to us through your word, to draw us into yourself in the sacraments, and sustain and prepare us as you never leave us alone! AMEN!